Better Markets, a non-profit Wall Street watchdog, filed a lawsuit Monday against the US Department of Justice (DOJ) alleging that its $13 billion settlement with JPMorgan Chase over the bank’s sale of toxic mortgage-backed securities in the run-up to the financial crisis was an illegal cover-up.
Better Markets said the deal, worked out in November 2013, “gave JP Morgan Chase… blanket civil immunity for years of alleged pervasive, egregious and knowing fraudulent and illegal conduct that contributed to the 2008 financial crash and the worst economy since the Great Depression.”
The lawsuit argues that the Department of Justice sought to use the deal—the largest settlement with a single entity in US history (by more than 300 percent)—to protect JPMorgan and its executives from prosecution. Under the terms of the settlement, the bank was not required to admit to any wrongdoing.
Better Markets alleges that, “the DOJ violated the Constitution and laws of the United States by using a mere contractual agreement to resolve claims of historic importance without subjecting the Agreement to independent judicial review.”"
